MASON CITY, Iowa — An Iowa woman convicted of helping her drug-dealing partner kill five people in 1993 wants her death penalty retrial moved out of state.
Angela Johnson's lawyers are asking a federal judge to move the retrial to Minnesota or out of western and central Iowa.
U.S. district judge who found flaws in Johnson's defense ordered a new sentencing trial but upheld the convictions. The 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in August that jurors must first decide whether Johnson is eligible for the death penalty, and then whether that should be imposed on each count.
Johnson and her then-boyfriend, Dustin Honken, were convicted of killing two former drug dealers who were cooperating with a federal investigation, one of the former dealer's girlfriends and her two kids.
